On Tue, Jul 28, 2015 at 05:22:35PM +0200, Jonas Smedegaard wrote: > Quoting Ole Streicher (2015-07-28 16:33:17) > > Ben Hutchings <b...@decadent.org.uk> writes: > >> Installation of a package from the 'metapackages' section does *not* > >> mark its dependencies as automatically installed. > > > > Really? So, if someone would install a metapackage (for a test), and > > then later uninstall it, its dependencies will remain on the system? > > That is my experience, yes. Seems specific to metapackages, so I > suspect there is some APT wizardry going on, treating those specially.
Currently yes, the keyword is as already noted in this thread APT::Never-MarkAuto-Section, minus a bug in the handling, but I actually intend to work on (read: remove/improve) this at DebCamp… all details read best here: #793360 This is handled in the autoinstall part of MarkInstall in libapt, so this only effects apt-based tools who rely on libapt doing the dependency resolving for them (aka: basically everyone expect aptitude). So whatever you observe with aptitude here is its own behaviour. > Also, even for non-metapackages, if some other package just _suggest_ > the package you pull in via depends/recommends, they stick as well. This is controlled by the APT::AutoRemove::SuggestsImportant option. Set it to false if you must, but realize that this makes autoremove a less save action as it removes features from a package (as the package is hopefully not suggesting the other package for nothing, but to provide an (obscure) feature you might or might not like to use). Same just stronger for recommends of course. This is handled by the autoremover (quelle surprise) in libapt, which tags packages as garbage or not – and leaves it up to the frontend if something is to be done with that information or not. So everyone is using the same info, it just depends what is actually done with it. > Both of above was not the case a few years ago... I can answer that exactly with a bit of git blaming: The first one was implemented by Michael Vogt eight years ago in apt version 0.7.5, released on 25 Jul 2007. The second was changed by me in apt version 0.8.15.3 from false to true, released four years ago on 25 Jul 2011. (I have no idea what it should tell you that the two releases are exactly 4 years apart, but it makes me a bit unhappy that this thread wasn't started 4 days earlier.) Best regards David Kalnischkies
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